Recording Unclear Injuries and Incidents
If an employee reports a condition but cannot say whether the symptoms first arose during work or during activities off work, the employer must evaluate the employee's work duties and environment to decide how to record the report.
Is this condition caused by an event at work? Don't know? Then it's not work-related.
For instance:
- if condition is reported and it is determined to be an isolated incident, it may not be work-related nor recordable;
- if one or more events or exposures in the work environment caused or contributed to an injury or illness, or it significantly aggravated a preexisting condition, the condition is both work-related and recordable.
Below are examples of work-related and non-work-related incidents:
- Work-related. If the employee is diagnosed with Lyme disease, the employer would determine the case to be work-related if the employee was a groundskeeper with regular exposure to outdoor conditions likely to result in contact with deer ticks.
- Work-related. If an employee trips while walking across a level factory floor, the resulting injury is considered work-related under the geographic presumption because the precipitating event -- the tripping accident -- occurred in the workplace. The case is work-related even if the employer cannot determine why the employee tripped, or whether any particular workplace hazard caused the accident to occur.
- Non-work-related. If an employee has a staph infection, the employer would consider the case not work-related if the infection is an isolated incident - no other employees with whom the newly infected employee had contact at work had been out with a staph infection.
- Non-work-related. If an employee reports a swollen joint, but cannot say whether it resulted from an event that occurred at work or at home, the employer might determine that the case is not work-related because the employee's work duties were unlikely to have caused, contributed to, or significantly aggravated such an injury.
Knowledge Check Choose the best answer for the question.
2-6. If an employee has a staph infection, the employer would consider the case not work-related if _____.
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